Diagnostic ultrasound is a commonly used technique in medicine and surgery that allows clinicians to see a two dimensional view of a particular body area. This is often used for viewing a fetus in a womb, a gallbladder, or heart valves or chambers. The equipment needed to conduct these types of scans is expensive, requires an experienced operator to perform the scan, and requires the patient to remain at the medical office or hospital during the scan. This technique provides a one-time view of a body area and is not used over a significant period of time for continuously monitoring the body area of interest. In certain situations, it is desirable to continuously or periodically monitor the anatomy of a specific body area of a patient. Some examples of such situations, during which continuous or periodic monitoring is desirable, include: monitoring a diameter of a jugular vein to assess central venous pressure CVP or jugular venous pressure JVP; monitoring a quantity of urine in a bladder; monitoring a quantity of a pleural effusion; or monitoring a quantity of ascites in an abdominal cavity. Many of the current diagnostic ultrasound devices cannot practically monitor the body area on a continuous basis at low cost with minimal inconvenience to the patient. Further, many of the current diagnostic ultrasound devices cannot determine if the monitored area of interest is the intended target area without conducting a scan at considerable expense.
A non-scanning, non-invasive, continuous monitoring, real-time ultrasonic device, and method for its use, is needed to reduce or eliminate one or more problems encountered by one or more of the existing ultrasonic scanning devices.